It gets worse before it gets better, right? This is Fynn’s idea of how to sort his drawings … really helps you feel like you’re making progress. It always seems like the point at which the papers and legos are scattered the farthest is when the landlord calls to say the realtor will be through in 2 hours with another possible tenant who wants to see the apartment. I go on a crazy cleanup binge so that they can at least walk from one end of the house to the other without breaking an ankle, but it starts to get a bit old.

Fynn’s kitchen for sale at one of our recent stoop sales … Things are starting to come together though, with the inevitable setbacks. Housing almost settled, will know for sure by tomorrow night. Bought a used car, which turned out be of the lemon variety and we should have done more homework I guess but the lemon law isn’t on our side so we’re sucking it up and paying for the repairs, despite the fact that it doubles the cost of the car and eats up what little cushion we had for anything else that might crop up. Life moves on. The boys are ecstatic to have a vehicle, they can’t remember the last time we owned one (9 years ago) and so they’re delighted every time they get a chance to ride in it. It’s a 4WD Jeep Cherokee, nice and old, and they feel like kings looking out the windows and being up high.

Packing is so slow, but the progress is starting to be visible. We have to be packed up in the next 7 days, and hopefully moved by the middle of next week, so that my husband can patch/paint our entire apartment before we actually get out. We plan to be camping out in whatever rooms he’s not working on, trying to keep cats out of the paint and getting in as many playdates and outings and visits as possible. Every time a friend calls and wants to hang out, I do because I don’t know when I’ll have the chance again, but it doesn’t help the boxing up part of the job. My sis arrives in 2 days, and I can’t wait for her help, not to mention her company and voice of reason and sanity.

Raiding the costume bin to attract customers to their sale, enticing them at the corner and leading them down the block … determined salesmen!I’m hanging on because the slope only goes down from here, and whatever will be, will be. Uncertainty? I’ve really started to make peace with it in the last few months, and so far it’s feeling great. There’s a dual freedom and terror in not knowing how you’re going to make a living, or even where you’ll be living, but it makes the possibilities feel almost endless. I know it’s affecting the boys similarly … they’re looking forward to the woods and river and fields (pending tomorrow’s outcome), but also trepidatious about missing friends and playdates and the routine they’ve grown used to here. We’ll find a new one, but getting them settled into it will take some time, and I hope I have the patience to ease them into it, remembering that it will take them emotional and physical time to adjust. I need to give myself that time too.

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We moved to Brooklyn when Douglas was 18 months, and I felt exhilarated and terrified … and even more lonely. The bigger and more crowded the city, the more it seems we build little imaginary walls around ourselves in order to stay sane while squished thigh-to-thigh with perfect strangers on the train. The desire to Not Get Involved is huge, but so is the ability to rally and connect and help when big things hit.

We moved to Chicago when I was seven, so Dad could manage Bible Truth Publishers, and my social circles shifted hugely. No local family other than my siblings and parents, a much larger meeting, and a growing awareness of politics and unspoken rules … still with a lot of love, but the rules had very obviously changed and the stakes were higher.

We're boondocking, in Oklahoma this time, needing a couple days to ourselves in-between visits. There's an increase in the down time we need, and I think it speaks to our desire to settle somewhere coming very close to the surface. It's been simmering for months. It means I've been thinking about community and fellowship a lot. Soaking it in where I can. Craving it. Studying it.